DVR ratings: 'Fringe,' 'Nikita' look to boost
renewal odds

post from Matt Carter's feed on 16 April 2012 02:44:49 PM. © Matt Carter's feed

When it comes to Friday nights, we are starting to get at a point now where DVR ratings are almost as important to check out as the ratings for the shows themselves. If you have a show like "Grimm...

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Andrew Marlowe Reacts to Winning TV Showrunner
Madness 2012

post from the TV addict on 16 April 2012 02:40:50 PM. © the TV addict

After an astounding 75,000 votes, what started with forty-eight very deserving showrunners in our[...]

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Craig Ferguson to interview Mila Kunis, Rashida
Jones at Scotland shows

post from Matt Carter's feed on 16 April 2012 02:37:37 PM. © Matt Carter's feed

Craig Ferguson is heading home to Scotland for a special edition of "The Late Late Show," and he is going to have some special guests along for the ride.The CBS host announced on Monday that beginning on...

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Joe Satran: Who's Winning The 'Game Of Thrones'
This Week

post from TV on HuffingtonPost.com on 16 April 2012 02:36:56 PM. © TV on HuffingtonPost.com

Note: Do not read on if you have not seen Season 2, Episode 3 of HBO's "Game of Thrones," entitled "What Is Dead May Never Die."

Here's a lesson: If a bad man with a sword is holding the pointy side towards your neck, he's probably going to push it through until blood gushes from your mouth.

No one's in a good mood this week as the North continues to mobilize, the Baratheons gather their respective armies and the Lannisters cling to King's Landing. When a man's killed, is it the executioner who held the sword or the king who gave the order who's responsible?

The answer? Maybe neither. Maybe both. Maybe just the cruel wind of fate, blowing through Westeros and killing everything in its path.

Let's get down to it:

The Power Rankings
Using a complex algorithm that takes into account each player's wealth, military might and dominion over lands, along with a "bonus" factor that adjusts for unquantifiable assets that could influence events, we've surveyed the lay of the land to figure out who's winning the game of thrones after Episode 3 of Season 2.

1. Renly Baratheon
Last week, we expressed some doubt about the reality of the rumors of Renly's strength. Well, now we've seen his army and we can attest that it really is as fearsome as people say: 100,000 people! That's just crazy. And they're not nobodies. In the distance are the great lords Leyton Hightower (of Oldtown), Mace Tyrrell (of Highgarden) and Randyll Tarly (of Horn Hill). But in the foreground are several fierce, young supporters of Renly's claim. The fiercest in battle -- at least, to judge by a tourney -- is Brienne of Tarth, a gargantuan, blonde woman known, meanly, as "The Beauty." But the two closest to Renly himself are Mace Tyrrell's two children, Loras and Margaery. The former is Renly's true, forbidden love -- but the latter is his Lady Macbeth-like wife, who knows all about Renly's gay proclivities, but is willing to put up with it for the sake of power. With these allies at Renly's side, we believe him when he promises Catelyn to bring her Joffrey's head.

2. Robb & Catelyn Stark
The Starks have one big problem right now: Theon. They'd hoped he would broker them an alliance with House Greyjoy, thus gaining naval support in the attack on the Lannisters' home territory in Casterly Rock. But we learned this episode that Balon Greyjoy has different plans altogether -- and they aren't good for the North. Theon had a chance to warn Robb, but he chose instead to stick to his blood family, ensuring trouble for the Northern Rebellion. On the other hand, Robb is still the only King in Westeros who's won a real battle. So if he can finish up affairs in the South, get his enemies to agree to an armistice, and get home in time to defend the coast from the Ironborn, he may still establish a strong Kingdom in the North, thus ensuring Stark power for perpetuity.

3. Tyrion & Tywin Lannister
Tyrion reaffirmed his skill as a political mastermind this episode when he played the other members of the small council off one another to see whose loyalty he could command. As it turned out, he can't trust Grandmaester Pycelle, who's been Cersei's bought man all along. Pycelle quickly learned the price of crossing Tyrion when he found himself beardless, locked in a black cell beneath Maegor's Holdfast. One other thing to note: The messages Tyrion gave the three, concerning Myrcella's marriage to three potential allies, displayed a keen eye for diplomacy. Having Dorne, and House Martell, in the pocket of the Lannisters really would bolster Joffrey's claim to the Throne.

4. Stannis Baratheon
No sight of Stannis this week, but our first glimpse of Renly's army (and his nifty little stag crown) shows us big brother has a reason to worry. While Stannis is conducting pagan rituals on the beach, Renly is rounding up the troops.

5. Joffrey & Cersei Lannister
Tyrion's not content to be a puppet Hand, and Cersei no longer has a mole in the old Maester. He may sit on the Iron Throne, but the Shithead King doesn't have much of a say in governing his realm. Tyrion's trying to get Myrcella off to Dorne, leading Cersei to do the dramatic pushing-glasses-off-the-table move. But she has to be used -- to end the war Joffrey's started.

Wildcards

Daenerys Targaryen
No Dany! No dragons! We assume she's still wandering the waste.

Sansa Stark
Sansa is counting the days till she can pledge her love to Joffrey, or so she says.

"Is Joffrey going to kill Sansa's brother?" Tommen asks at dinner?
"He might," says Cersei. "Would you like that?"
"No, I don't think so," Tommen replies, as Sansa stays silent.

But she's got a new handmaiden -- Tyrion's whore, Shae, who isn't very good at serving. Shae can't wash the linens, but she brushes Sansa's hair as she cries.

Bran Stark
Our little crippled seer wakes with the taste of blood in his mouth, still reeling from a dream in which he killed in the body of his direwolf. The Maester isn't so sure, but Bran's convinced.

"My dreams are different. My dreams are true," he says.

Arya Stark
Arya, meanwhile, can't sleep: The image of her father's execution flares behind her closed eyes. But it's okay -- before she has a chance to lie awake too long, red cloaks from the South, led by Ser Amory Lorch, ride in and start killing everyone. Arya frees some prisoners from a burning cart, before she's seized to be taken to Harrenhall.

A little boy lies on the ground with an arrow in his thigh. He can't walk, he tells the raiders.

"Can't walk?" one asks, before thrusting his sword through the boy's neck. But there's an upside -- Arya tells the men the dead boy is Gendry, saving this Baratheon bastard for now.

Jon Snow
Craster's murdering his babies as offerings, but the Lord Commander's unfazed. Jon, however, has a difficult lesson to learn. "We have other wars to fight and like it or not, we need men like Craster," Mormont tells Jon. It doesn't pay to be a hero. Which doesn't stop poor romantic Samwell, who gives away his mother's thimble in lieu of saving his lady.

Theon Greyjoy
This former ward of the Starks doesn't have enough seawater in his veins to please daddy Balon, another megalomaniac monarch out to seize back his territory -- as well as the Stark lands of the North. While sister Yara gets 30 longships, Theon gets one (the Sea Bitch -- "We thought she'd be perfect for you," Yara says).

Theon's weak, Balon tells him, reminding him of the Iron Islands ethos: "We do not sow. We are iron born. We do not plough the fields or toil in the mine. We take what is ours." So Theon burns the warning letter he'd planned to send Robb and heads to the craggy shore to consecrate his faith to the Drowned God by a baptism of seawater.

"What is dead may never die," the priest says. "But rises again, harder and stronger."

Petyr Baelish
Tyrion tells Petyr to get Myrcella married off to Robin of the Vale, promising him Harrenhal, and the title of Lord of the Riverlands, one of the most prominent positions in the country. Petyr's skeptical, but Tyrion leaves him no choice. Of course, Tyrion's been playing games. "I don't appreciate being made a fool of, dwarf," Petyr says. Tyrion's got another job for Littlefinger, though: negotiator-in-chief with Catelyn Stark.

Varys
"Well played, my lord hand," Varys compliments him on his ruse.

"Power resides where men believe it resides," the smiling eunuch tells Tyrion. "It's a trick, a shadow on the wall, and a very small man can cast a very large shadow."

Differences from the Book
This season is really going further and further off track from "A Clash of Kings," the novel upon which it's based. Some of the changes are completely understandable for the sake of expedience, but others are just plan weird. Here's what we noticed; as ever, let us know if you spotted others!

Shae does eventually become Sansa's handmaiden in the books, but not nearly this early. She worked for another young noble, Lollys Stokeworth, beforehand.
The entire sequence involving Arya's capture by Lannister forces is far more drawn out in the books. Though the battle is basically similar, there was a whole other part of the plot where Arya, Hot Pie, Gendry and Lommy walked, by foot, through the Riverlands.
The Loras-Renly affair is not explicitly depicted in the books, so we didn't see the scene in which Maergery reveals her knowledge of it.
Bran's line about his dream's being "true" was originally voiced by the Crannogman Jojen Reed, who we hear will not be appearing in the show.

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'Smash's' Uma Thurman Teases Rebecca Duvall's
Impact: There's Drama Everywhere

post from Hollywood Reporter - Live Feed on 16 April 2012 02:36:06 PM. © Hollywood Reporter - Live Feed

Lesley Goldberg
"She brings a new dynamic onto set and causes drama everywhere she turns," the actress says ahead of her second episode of the NBC Broadway drama.

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'Simpsons' Finally Reveals True Location Of
Springfield

post from TV on HuffingtonPost.com on 16 April 2012 02:33:22 PM. © TV on HuffingtonPost.com

After a week of conflicting reports about the true location of "The Simpsons'" hometown of Springfield, series creator Matt Groening sought to clear up some of the confusion -- by telling people to stop guessing.

In the opening credits of Sunday night's episode, Bart can be seen in detention writing on the chalkboard, "The true location of Springfield is in any state but yours," over and over again.

The basis of the confusion originated in an interview that Groening, a Portland, Oregon native, gave to Smithsonian Magazine in which he talked about how he was influenced by "Father Knows Best." The series was set in a fictionalized town called Springfield, which he thought growing up was the Springfield in his home state.

Groening told the magazine, "When I grew up, I realized it was just a fictitious name. I also figured out that Springfield was one of the most common names for a city in the U.S. In anticipation of the success of the show, I thought, 'This will be cool; everyone will think it's their Springfield.' And they do."

That quote was widely misinterpreted, and reports surfaced all over the Internet that Groening had set "The Simpsons" in Springfield, Oregon, 100 miles away from his hometown.

Groening later clarified to TV Guide that the Springfield on "The Simpsons" was not in Oregon.

After his latest statement on the topic, it looks like the joke is on anyone who spent any time trying to read between the lines to solve a TV mystery that doesn't appear to have an answer.

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Best moment of reunion Part 1. Also, my spirit
animal.

post from LoveHateTV: for the Love of Reality TV on 16 April 2012 02:32:18 PM. © LoveHateTV: for the Love of Reality TV

Best moment of reunion Part 1. Also, my spirit animal.

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Game of Thrones, "What Is Dead May Never Die":
What We're Still Talking About

This week's Game of Thrones introduces us to a few new characters, while giving a bit of the spotlight to Tyrion, Theon, and Renly, and happily, there's no Joffrey again this week (though we get a good bit of Sansa). Renly is on a throne with a new wife, Theon makes a decision about where his loyalty lies, and Tyrion masterfully orchestrates a ruse. Oh, and as usual, there is a ton of blood courtesy of some very stabby soldiers.

We're missing scenes with Dany and Robb, but lots of action goes down in Westeros this week. Ready to recap? Just keep reading.

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'Dancing with the Stars' pro Cheryl Burke:
William Levy still performing

Did Cheryl Burke just confirm that William Levy will still be performing on "Dancing with the Stars" Monday night? Not entirely, but she did at least make it clear that the current plan was for the two of...

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LISTEN: Maroon 5 Drops New Summertime Track

Maroon 5 has released their new single "Payphone," featuring rapper Wiz Khalifa, off their upcoming fourth studio album, Overexposed.

The uptempo pop track is sure to be a summertime smash among female fans, especially with a chorus like: "If happy ever after did exist / I would still be holding you like this / All those fairytales are full of it / One more stupid love song I’ll be safe."

It's definitely one of the band's most pop-y singles to date, which makes sense. According to frontman -- and resident "Voice" judge -- Adam Levine, Overexposed will be the band's "most diverse and poppiest albums yet."

Maroon 5's last hit summertime single, 2011's "Moves Like Jagger," was a commercial success, going to the top of the charts in 18 countries. In the U.S., "Moves Like Jagger" was Maroon 5's first top ten single since 2007's "Makes Me Wonder."

Overexposed, which is slated for a June 26 release, was executive produced by Max Martin with additional tracks produced by Benny Blanco and Ryan Tedder.